Riz Ahmed on why a South Asian woman should write 'Ms. Marvel'

In May, Riz Ahmed floated an idea that made more than a few headlines. The Rogue One actor tweeted that he, Mindy Kaling and Kumail Nanjiani should pen a script for Ms. Marvel, which would mark the first Muslim superhero movie.

Kaling (The Mindy Project) quickly signed on to the hypothetical Marvel Cinematic Universe project, and Twitter was appropriately hyped.

While at San Diego Comic-Con promoting his upcoming, completed Marvel-based film Venom, Ahmed walked back on his potential personal involvement in such a movie while voicing strong support for the idea.

“I think there are much better qualified people to write the better Ms. Marvel movie than myself, and specifically I think it should be led by women — South Asian women,” Ahmed told us (watch above).

Ahmed cited G. Willow Wilson and Sana Amanat, who helped originate the story of Kamala Khan — the fourth character to take the banner of Ms. Marvel — in 2013. Khan was first introduced as a 16-year-old Pakistani-American girl from New Jersey who turns from a teen who idolizes Carol Danvers (i.e., Captain Marvel) to a superhero in her own right.

“It should really be led by women of color and Muslim women to tell that story,” Ahmed said. “My tweet there was really just an attempt to shine a little bit of light on this project and just to let people know that there’s a lot of anticipation around this character as we enter a time when we’re looking to superheroes to give us the heroes that we might lack in real life.”

“That’s a character that can inspire a lot of people,” he added. “So that was really just my way of fanning out.”